Science Daily March 3, 2022 A team of researchers in the US (University of Illinois, UMass Amherst, Stanford University) expanded molecular alphabet for DNA data storage comprising four natural and seven chemically modified nucleotides that are readily detected and distinguished using nanopore sequencers. They showed that Mycobacterium smegmatis porin A (MspA) nanopores can accurately discriminate 77 combinations and orderings of chemically diverse monomers within homo- and heterotetrameric sequences. The sequencing accuracy exceeded 60%. The extended molecular alphabet may potentially offer a nearly 2-fold increase in storage density and potentially the same order of reduction in the recording latency, thereby enabling […]
Category Archives: Data storage
Magnetic ‘hedgehogs’ could store big data in a small space
Nanowerk December 17, 2021 An international team of researchers (USA- Ohio State University, Mexico) used a magnetic microscope to visualize the patterns formed in thin films of manganese germanide. The magnetism in this material follows helices, like the structure of DNA which leads to numerous patterns. The images revealed that in certain parts of the sample, the magnetism at the surface was twisted into a pattern resembling the spikes of a hedgehog, about 50 nanometers in size. The hedgehog patterns could be shifted on the surface with electric currents or inverted with magnetic fields. This foreshadows the reading and writing […]
Ultrafast magnetism: Heating magnets, freezing time
Phys.org October 18, 2021 Magnetic solids can be demagnetized quickly with a short laser pulse. However, the microscopic mechanisms of ultrafast demagnetization remain unclear. Researchers in Germany have developed a method to quantify the temperature-dependent electron–phonon scattering rate in gadolinium measuring independently the electron-phonon scattering rate for the 5d and the 4f electrons. They deduced the temperature dependence of scattering for the 5d electrons, while no effect on the phonon population is observed for the 4f electrons. The results suggest that the ultrafast magnetization dynamics in Gd is triggered by the spin-flip in the 5d electrons, found evidence of the […]
Storing data as mixtures of fluorescent dyes
Science Daily October 13, 2021 A team of researchers in the US (Harvard University, Northwestern University) has shown that digital data can be stored in mixtures of fluorescent dye molecules, which are deposited on a surface by inkjet printing, where an amide bond tethers the dye molecules to the surface. A microscope equipped with a multichannel fluorescence detector distinguishes individual dyes in the mixture. The presence or absence of these molecules in the mixture encodes binary information (0 or 1). The use of mixtures of molecules, instead of sequence-defined macromolecules, minimizes the time and difficulty of synthesis and eliminates the […]
Our DNA is becoming the world’s tiniest hard drive
Phys.org October 4, 2021 The multipart architecture of current DNA-based recording techniques renders them inherently slow and incapable of recording fluctuating signals with subhour frequencies. To address this limitation, a team of researchers in the US (Northwestern University, Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University, MIT, University of Pennsylvania) developed a simplified system employing a single enzyme, terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT), to transduce environmental signals into DNA. TdT adds nucleotides to the 3′-ends of single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) in a template-independent manner, selecting bases according to inherent preferences and environmental conditions. By characterizing TdT nucleotide selectivity under different conditions, they showed that TdT […]
One material with two functions could lead to faster memory
Science Daily August 23, 2021 Previous versions of light-emitting memories required the integration of two separate devices with differing materials, complicating fabrication. Using just one perovskite layer between contacts an international team of researchers (Taiwan, Japan) fabricated a device that works both as a RRAM and a light-emitting electrochemical cell. By taking advantage of the fast, electrically switchable ionic motion that enables this dual functionality in a single layer of perovskite they connected two devices together and developed an all-inorganic perovskite light-emitting memory. They used perovskite quantum dots of two different sizes for the two devices in the light-emitting memory […]
On the road to faster and more efficient data storage
Phys.org August 18, 2021 Antiferromagnet is a promising candidate for developing the next generation of information technology. An international team of researchers (Germany, Sweden, Japan, Italy) showed that domain walls play an active role in the dynamic properties of the antiferromagnet nickel oxide. The experiments revealed that magnetic waves with different frequencies could be induced, amplified, and even coupled with each other across different domains—but only in the presence of domain walls. The ability highlights the potential to actively control the propagation of magnetic waves in time and space as well as energy transfer among individual waves at the femtosecond […]
The world’s thinnest technology—only two atoms thick
Phys.org June 30, 2021 An international team of researchers (Israel, Japan) reports a stable ferroelectric order emerging at the interface between two naturally grown flakes of hexagonal boron nitride, which were stacked together in a metastable non-centrosymmetric parallel orientation. They observed alternating domains of inverted normal polarization, caused by a lateral shift of one lattice site between the domains. Reversible polarization switching coupled to lateral sliding was achieved by scanning a biased tip above the surface. Their calculations trace the origin of the phenomenon to a subtle interplay between charge redistribution and ionic displacement and provide intuitive insights to explore […]
Ultra-high-density hard drives made with graphene ‘overcoats’ store ten times more data
Nanowerk June 7, 2021 Currently, carbon-based overcoats (COCs), layers used to protect platters from mechanical damages and corrosion, occupy a significant part of this spacing. An international team of researchers (India, Singapore, UK, USA – Argonne National Laboratory, University of Illinois, Switzerland) replaced commercial COCs with one to four layers of graphene which fulfills all the ideal properties of an HDD overcoat in terms of corrosion protection, low friction, wear resistance, hardness, lubricant compatibility, and surface smoothness. They transferred graphene onto hard disks made of iron-platinum as the magnetic recording layer, and tested Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording (HAMR) that enables an […]
Translation software enables efficient DNA data storage
Nanowerk April 2, 2021 In support of the IARPA Molecular Information Storage (MIST) program researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed a software called the Adaptive DNA Storage Codec (ADS Codex), that translates data files from what a computer understands into what biology understands. The short-term goal of MIST is to write 1 terabyte—a trillion bytes—and read 10 terabytes within 24 hours for $1,000. ADS Codex addresses two big obstacles to creating DNA data files: Figured out new strategies for error correction as the error rates while writing to molecular storage; Added additional information called error detection codes […]